The city has bought 1,080 gallons of beet juice that it will test on city streets and freeways.

When added to brine -- water with a heavy salt concentration -- the mixture freezes at a lower temperature than brine alone.

"The manufacturer says it works well to 30 below, and there is not much that works to that temperature," said Mary Carran Webster, the city's assistant public service director. "We are going to be experimenting with it in various temperatures and various snow amounts."

The beet juice also can be added to a salt and calcium chloride mix, which is spread after snow and ice have landed. That would reduce the amount of calcium chloride, which is more corrosive to cars, bridge decks and steel.

"It is a 'green' treatment," Webster said.

With temperatures forecast to dip below freezing overnight and possible precipitation, city trucks were spreading brine on ramps, bridges and overpasses yesterday.

That solution did not include the beet juice. The city plans to wait until a snowfall of at least 1 inch is forecast and use the beet juice in the brine pre-treatment, then in the salt treatment after the snow falls.

The concoction will be applied only to Rt. 315 and a yet-to-be-identified Downtown route during the testing period, Webster said.

Akron experimented with the beet juice last winter and plans to use 12,000 to 16,000 gallons of the stuff this year.

The beets, which have a high concentration of sucrose, are grown commercially as a sweetener. However, the sugar must be removed for the juice to be sold as a de-icing agent.

"If sugared, you are going to pull animals to the roadway," said Paul Barnett, Akron's public works manager. "If it is sugared and you store it, it will ferment like beer."

Sold under the name Geomelt, the beet juice is brown, and gives salt and the brine liquid a similar hue.

"You will notice the difference as it is falling off the trucks," Barnett said.

"Everybody thinks: beet juice, purple, stains. This washes right off. Purple beets, you eat. Most food products with sweetener in it, it is beet sugar."

Concentrated beet juice has a pungent smell. When mixed with brine, the concoction has only a slight odor similar to brewing beer, Barnett said.

The beet juice cost $4.21 a gallon, compared with 65 cents a gallon for calcium chloride, Webster said. But the beet juice is supposed to be more effective.

"When it snows, we may have to go over the same route three times applying salt and calcium chloride. According to the manufacturer, we should only have to go once (with the beet juice solution)," Webster said.

However, Barnett said, Akron plans to use the beet juice only in the brine this year because it was not as effective in the calcium-chloride solution last year.